Field of the Disclosure
The present disclosure generally relates to powering electronic devices, and more particularly, to a power supply with a variable configurable current limit that may be configured by a load device.
Description of the Related Art
Power supplies provide power to charge the batteries and to provide power to electronic devices. The rate at which a load device can charge its battery depends on the current supplied by power supply. A higher current equates generally to a shorter charging time. Typically, when charging, the load device may be configured to draw the maximum allowed current from the power supply. However, the current level of the power supply signal also affects the amount of heat generated in the load device by its charging circuitry and battery. Other entities in the load device also generate heat, such as the active computing components (e.g., processor, memory, transceiver, etc.) that support operation of the device. The internal temperature of the load device and the external temperature felt by a user handling the device (i.e., skin temperature) is affected by all of the heat generating entities in the device. Performance limits (e.g., maximum processor speed) are typically set for a load device so that the internal and external temperatures do not exceed thresholds. These limits are set based on worst case thermal conditions, such as maximum processing load, maximum charging rate, etc. A load device can be equipped with functionality to control its processing activities for thermal mitigation, however, the heat component from the power supply is generally fixed based on the current supplied by the power supply.
The present disclosure is directed to various methods and devices that may solve or at least reduce some of the problems identified above.
The use of the same reference symbols in different drawings indicates similar or identical items.